Saturday, December 14, 2013

...“Judging by his remarks, Roger Waters has absorbed classic anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, and these have now seeped into the totality of his views,” Abraham H. Foxman, National Director of the ADL), told The Times of Israel. “His comments about Jews and Israel have gotten progressively worse over time. It started with anti-Israel invective, and has now morphed into conspiratorial anti-Semitism.”

Added Foxman: “How sad that a creative genius could become so perverted by his own narrow-minded bigotry.”

Abraham Foxman, national director of the Anti-Defamation League.

(photo credit: Miriam Alster/Flash90)

In the interview, Waters — a longtime supporter of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement — remarked, regarding the Palestinians, that the “parallels with what went on in the ’30s in Germany are so crushingly obvious.

“There were many people that pretended that the oppression of the Jews was not going on. From 1933 until 1946,” Waters said. “So this is not a new scenario. Except that this time it’s the Palestinian people being murdered.”

Waters, an outspoken critic of Israel who urges fellow artists not to play concerts in Israel, came under fire in July for using a pig-shaped balloon with Jewish symbols, including a Star of David, at his concerts.

Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Center denounced the balloon as a “grotesque display of Jew-hatred” and called Waters an “open hater of Jews.”

An op-ed in the Vatican newspaper at the time blasted “unrestrained anti-Semitism” at the music festival in Belgium where Waters displayed the inflatable balloon. “… Did they also have the right to draw the Star of David on the back of a pig and not be reported?” the article asked. “We continue to talk about the respect for every religion and every human being, yet we keep falling into these shameful situations.”...

...Last August, Waters issued a public letter to musicians to boycott Israel. A few months earlier, in an interview with The Huffington Post, Waters remarked that the US has a “knee-jerk” policy to support “anything” that Israel does.

Thursday, December 12, 2013

From the National Post, 2 Dec 2013, by Emanuele Ottolenghi* and Saeed Ghasseminejad:

The
billions of dollars Iran can now access due to reduced sanctions will most
directly benefit the Supreme Leader and his Revolutionary Guards.

If any proof was needed
that the nuclear compromise hammered out in Geneva last month between Iran and
the six world powers is a mistake, look no further than the psychological
impact it had on Iran’s sanctions’ battered economy. Evidence of such boost is already
available: Within hours, Iran’s currency, the Rial, appreciated by 5% and
shares of petrochemical companies soared on Tehran’s Stock Exchange, a sure
sign that the agreement provides an economic lifeline to the Iranian regime in
exchange for no meaningful or irreversible concessions.

Rather than claiming that
the international community is offering modest and reversible sanctions’ relief
to Iran, Western negotiators should be more candid and admit that theirs is a
self-defeating proposition. The main beneficiaries will not be the ordinary
Iranians for which Western policymakers constantly express concern when they
fret about their own sanctions’ impact. The benefits will instead flow to
Iran’s military-industrial complex, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ Corps
(IRGC) and the Supreme Leader – those most invested in the nuclear program and
least inclined to renounce their nuclear quest for economic incentives.

By relaxing sanctions
against the petrochemical and automotive industries, the United States and
Europe are giving them a cash bonanza. By committing themselves to no
nuclear-related sanctions in the six-month interim period established by the
agreement, Western governments will also enable Iran to exponentially expand
the impact of sanctions’ relief. In practice, the deal authorizes business with
the sanctioned IRGC through the backdoor.

Take the petrochemical
sector — a key export area for Iran but also a sensitive industry due to the
dual-use nature of the technology it requires.

Military involvement in
this sector is mainly through the Parsian Oil and Gas Company (POGC), which is
controlled by the IRGC through Ghadir Investment Company (80.18%), the Bahman
Group (1.1%) and Kia Mahestan Company (1.66%), with a total market value of
approximately $3.83-billion. The IRGC also controls Pardis Petrochemical (worth
$2-billion), Kermanshah Petrochemical worth ($527-million) and Shiraz
Petrochemical (worth $922-million).

Rey Investment, an entity
directly controlled by the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, owns several
spare car parts companies, and has the exclusive dealership for the German
car-maker, BMW in Iran

The price tag for
IRGC-controlled assets in the petrochemical industry is $7.3b-illion. Add to
that Pars Oil and Behran Oil, the two companies controlled by the Supreme
Leader through Rey Investment Group, Tadbir Group and the Mostazafan
Foundation, which are worth a total of $625-million. Since Iran’s petrochemical
sector is worth almost $25-billion; in practice, one third of the industry —
$8-billion — is controlled by the two Iranian centres of power in charge of
nuclear proliferation.

The car industry is no less
problematic — although U.S. sanctions against the automotive sector did not
specifically target it on non-proliferation grounds, Iran has used it to
procure needed items and materials for its nuclear and ballistic missile
programs over the years. Khodro and Saipa, the two main players in the car
industry, are government-controlled; their procurement networks raise concerns,
given that the car industry, much like the petrochemical industry, relies on
sensitive dual-use technology and raw materials.

Besides, the regime
benefits from its revenues. Of its main players, the Bahman Group is controlled
by the IRGC — its main shareholder is the sanctioned Bonyad Ta’avon Sepah — a
company linked to Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. As recently reported by Saeed
Ghasseminejad in The Times of Israel, Rey Investment, an entity
directly controlled by the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, owns several
spare car parts companies, and has the exclusive dealership for the German
car-maker, BMW in Iran. As for Iran Khodro, its main shareholder — Iran’s IDRO
— is a government entity under sanctions.

The Obama administration
will no doubt argue that there is no sanctions’ relief for the IRGC — but most
of the aforementioned companies are not designated yet. If the U.S. President
were to target them under existing executive orders, Iran would denounce such a
move as a violation of Western commitments not to impose new sanctions. If
Western or Asian companies were punished for conducting financial transactions
with IRGC companies in the petrochemical sector, Iran’s rulers would scream
murder. The administration may not have thought through this loophole — but it
is unlikely to jeopardize a deal it hails as historic.

The agreement does not
constitute an incentive for Iran to comply with its international obligations.
To the contrary, it offers much needed relief to its procurement efforts, a
cash windfall to its channels of proliferation, and financial profit along the
way. And given that little is expected of Iran in return, it is hard to believe
Western powers thought this was a good idea.

This is a great deal — for
Iran. But if the West wishes to prevent Iran from crossing the nuclear finish
line, this is definitely not the way forward.

*Emanuele Ottolenghi
is a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Saeed
Ghasseminejad is a Ph.D candidate in finance at City University of New York.

From Israel MFA, 4 Dec 2013:Convicted murderers - 52 of them already released
from prison by Israel as part of the negotiating process with the Palestinians -
are receiving grants of up to $50,000 and monthly stipends of up to nearly
$4,000.

The Palestinian Authority (PA) is giving very large
grants and generous monthly stipends to terrorists. These convicted murderers -
52 of whom already have been released from prison by Israel in the framework of
the negotiating process with the Palestinians - are receiving grants of up to
$50,000 and monthly stipends of up to nearly $4,000.

Thus the PA
is supporting incitement to terrorism, including through the misuse of foreign
financial assistance.

According to Nael Ghannam, the Director of the PA's Ministry of Prisoners'
Affairs, former prisoners who were incarcerated for more than 15 years receive
grants of $2,000 per year of imprisonment, for a maximum amount of $50,000
(although there are credible reports of at least one bonus of
$60,000).

The amounts of money being bestowed upon these
terrorists are large not only in and of themselves, but in particular in
contrast to the average monthly salaries of Palestinian workers in the West
Bank, which stands at $641, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics.

Many of these
terrorists will receive the maximum amount of $50,000. When the negotiations
between Israel and the Palestinians began on July 30, 2014, Israel agreed to
release 104 terrorists who had been in prison since before the 1993 Oslo peace
process. All were heavily involved in terrorist activities and in acts of
murder. Instead of condemning their heinous acts, the PA praises them as heroes,
setting them up to be figures of inspiration for the younger
generation.

Examples:

Among those who will receive at least $50,000 is the most veteran prisoner,
Issa Abed Rabbo, who shot to death two young Hebrew University students
hiking near Bethlehem in 1984. In addition to the grant and salary, the
PA also offered to cover the expenses of his wedding.

Abu-Musa Atia, who used an ax to murder Isaac Rotenberg, a Holocaust
survivor who had escaped from the Sobibor death camp.

Yusef Hazaa who murdered two Israeli teachers, one of them
a 19-year-old volunteer.

Sualha Husseini and Almajed Mahmed who carried out a stabbing attack
on a crowded bus, killed 24-year-old Baruch Heizler and wounding three
young women.

These grants and salaries are not the only
financial rewards given by the PA to convicted terrorists. Prisoners
serving time in Israeli prisons for terrorism-related offences are paid a
monthly salary by the PA. According to the Palestinian newspaper
Al-Hayat Al-Jadida (15 April 2011), salaries for serving prisoners range from
approximately $390 to over $3,300, depending on the length of imprisonment. This
means that the terrorists who carried out the most horrific attacks receive the
highest salaries.

The Palestinian Authority is highly dependent
on foreign aid. This money, which supports the PA budget, is used to meet
payments for imprisoned and released terrorists. For example, in 2012
the PA paid over $75 million to terrorists in Israeli prisons, and $78 million
to the families of deceased terrorists (including suicide bombers). Together,
these amounts account for over 16% of the annual foreign donations and grants to
the PA budget.Publically rewarding convicted murderers gives an official stamp of approval to terrorist attacks on Israeli civilians. It is a highly persuasive form of incitement to violence and terrorism.Providing financial support for terrorists not only violates basic morality, it encourages further terrorist outrages. [For example, it may tempt young Palestinians to seek an answer to familial financial difficulties through the use of violence].The international community should express their outrage at this abuse of funding that was given for the proper management of PA institutions and for promoting peaceful coexistence with Israel.

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